WHERE GRASS IS GREEN. 165 



out like a fan. Five times I put her up, and she 

 repeated the "chack" with the same manoeuvres 

 each time. Then she was left in peace that day; 

 but from time to time, for nine days, I visited 

 this most interesting family. Very cautiously did 

 I peer round that bush in order to watch their 

 domestic arrangements. The young ones grew 

 apace, but they never moved from the spot they 

 had been hatched out in. Like toads, they had 

 hollowed out their resting-place so that their backs 

 were almost level with the top of the dry furze-needle 

 litter. 



One day the mother-bird was fast asleep, hovering 

 her two chicks, not for warmth certainly, for the 

 spot where they lay was hot in the daytime and 

 warm all through the dewless nights. To all ap- 

 pearance there was just a tuft of dead furze lying, 

 as you may see thousands of tufts in the course of a 

 mile's walk. As I bent eagerly over her, to observe 

 better one of the most perfect and harmless de- 

 ceptions I have ever seen, one of my feet just 

 touched the dead thorn-branch already mentioned. 

 For one moment a large dark eye met my own, 

 and then there was a "flip" and a "chack," 



